Japan’s “shōtengai,” or shopping arcades, typically a covered approach to a station lined by small shops, as well as its high streets, have increasingly come to resemble deserted avenues lined by shutters, especially in the nation’s increasingly depopulated and geriatric regional cities.

Dubbed “shutter-dōri,” or “shutter streets,” these streets have become a potent symbol of urban decay and the demographic and economic collapse Japan faces.

Of course, the real situation is not quite so simple. Japan’s regions have long been emptying, but far from disappearing much of the population, especially the younger generations, have been moving into the vast conurbations of Kanto and Kinki, where populations continue to increase.

Even so, in the streets of the capital rusty shutters and large, deserted roads are not an uncommon sight in the less central areas.

The small stores of the arcades are not just the victims of regional enervation – Japanese now find themselves increasingly preferring convenience stores and large scale high street chains to the uncompetitive vendors who once lined every station thoroughfare.

Watch the 2009 documentary 'The Secret of Oz' and understand the root cause of many of the worlds problems lies in banking elites controlling the quantity of money in the global economy - rather than nation states. If you are ever going to accept a conspiracy theory - this is the most likely and realistic conspiracy I know of.

Let's not forget that these teens who don't go out (forgot what they are called) can also play as one of the missing factors here since they've becoming too common in Japan. And i also bet that it's not common in Japanese teen to go out and roam around in their country - bet most of the teens and otakus who have seen this won't even recognize 1/4 of the places shown here.

to all the idiots claiming this is just shots of vacation or early hrs keep
shutting your eyes to reality, hopefully you will fall in a pit and stop burdening the world.
This happening in a lot of countries not just Japan and is no laughing matter as it is followed by desperation and crime.
so keep laughing idiots but pray that when you need a job they don't tell you
you aren't needed.

Globalization was here. Small business are dying, time to monopolize and raise prices on the unemployed masses. They'll steal from each other to buy our over hyped, poorly built merchandise. We get blood money, they get slavery and prison.

Seriously though, should we be sad about this? The 50's are nice for a couple of hours when you watch Always San Chome No Yuhi, but you probably wouldn't want to live there. Neither should you worry about shotengais disappearing because they just aren't needed anymore.

It is no surprise to myself. I was deployed to Yokosuka back in 2002 and saw such shuttered sites then in that city and then in Tokyo in 2003. So as far back at that, this has been happening. I guess that this has accelerated since then though.

Yeah, it sure looks depressing, but it doesn't mean the people who once did business there just vanished. There are lots of newly build big department buildings, mostly near the train stations; it's where most of the merchants have moved.

So, sure, the small stores aren't outside anymore, but the merchants do exist. It's like in Akihabara, where most of the small (and often boroi) restaurants near the station have had to make space for giant buildings like Yodobashi Akiba and the high buildings on the opposite side. Once you get inside, you can notice small restaurant en masse.

It's not the same feeling eating there, but at least the chance to choose between really many kinds of food is still there.

Times and preferences change. It's a fact of life. These may have served their communities well decades ago, but now people want a greater selection of more or less the same stuff at lower prices. Consolidation in retail and improved distribution channels have made this possible. Newer big-box outfits (even in Japan) have less character, but they seem to be serving their generic function well. That's a choice customers made, right or wrong, and it works given existing physical & social infrastructure.

Maybe care facilities for the elderly next to these stores may bring in more traffic, for instance. Alternatively, these communities should consider what stores are sustainable, and how to better transition the people and space so urban blight is minimized. Abandoned 'dead malls' mentioned by a poster above often haunt neighborhoods for longer than they should in the US.

man this is really depressing, its the same thing that happend to america when wal-mart popped up. its disappointing because i have never been to japan yet and it will not be the same as the last decade. i even wish i could see America in its different booms like drive in theaters n such. WE might think they will bounce back but small buisness strips in america never do -_-

Unless this is all a clever ruse to get people there to spend more money...I could capture the same scene anywhere if I took photos at 5AM.

But, I guess it's believable. Right down the street from me, a multi-million dollar movie theatre was torn down because it was built in an area where business died all around it.

In the suburban sprawls in the US, we commonly have the problem of areas getting to the point where poor people inhabit the housing around businesses. This drags the safety and overall classiness of the businesses down, so they take their businesses elsewhere and leave dead shopping centers in their wake.